


Like The Setting Sun

by Cheeto_Breath



Series: Criminal Minds Drabbles [1]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, Drug Use, Friends With Benefits, Introspection, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-25 23:28:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16207913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cheeto_Breath/pseuds/Cheeto_Breath
Summary: Reid would've relapsed before considering Derek Morgan a second withdrawal.





	Like The Setting Sun

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Neil Young's "The Needle and The Damage Done"

 

To Reid, Morgan is a substitute for Dilaudid—the purpled, puckered skin from his lips, the hypnosis from blood-stained clothes and bullet-holes—but still, Reid never planned on addiction: would’ve relapsed before considering Derek Morgan a second, fatiguing withdrawal.   

Derek Morgan was casual—blend of best friend and benefits—and Reid and Morgan are logical, calculating FBI agents, but from March to June, a "one-time-thing" became a series of injections; neutralization, adieu to Carl Buford and Tobias Hankel through sugar-pill symptoms. Maybe, that was Reid licking his wounds—the narcotics, the unrepaired shield from the untreated trauma—or a weakness; but, all the same, Morgan’s handprints across his forearm were alcohol, anesthetics and love-drunk madness combined, and Reid fell in love with the rehab-like escapism.

Reid and Morgan are 1:30 a.m. kisses and hands carded through curls and latched on extra-skin; naked bodies and misplaced sweet-nothings in a "non-romantic" setting. March to June are months of detached, meaningless sex—or that's what Reid tells himself in his post-sex high; reeling from his emotions and lightheadedness. Morgan is Reid's vice in an indescribable man—as dangerous and addictive as a discarded needle—and Reid never expects to recover or be separated. Reid also never expects to fall for Morgan, but Morgan's never subscribed to Reid's expectations and the giggle on his lips and butterflies in his stomach feels like addiction.

Reid has read Thomas Hobbes, he understands self-preservation: Morgan has adopted Reid's coping-mechanisms and Reid has reaped the benefits—two shells buried in an ocean of pain-induced decisions—but Morgan is more than "pretty-boy" Reid's refuge on weekends. Morgan is a colleague and friend; he deserves more than a casual relationship with a drug-addicted colleague—regardless the "love" in their superficial relationship. Morgan deserves rehabilitation, and Reid wonders if withdrawal is replacing addiction.

Now, shooting up Dilaudid, Reid sees Morgan.

_“Here I am trying to live, or rather, I am trying to teach the death within me how to live.”_

_― Jean Cocteau_

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr: @rereiding
> 
> Kudos/Comments appreciated.


End file.
